


If We Grow Up, We're All Going To Be Famous

by feverbeats



Category: Heroes (TV)
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-08
Updated: 2019-09-08
Packaged: 2020-10-12 04:02:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,983
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20557916
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/feverbeats/pseuds/feverbeats
Summary: The fair-haired man moves like a shadow across the plains, running in armor that glints like scales. The sky is bright and dark by turns, a storm brewing. There are cherry blossoms crushed under her feet.When he's close enough for her to see his face, he says, "Hello, angel. Been waiting long?""Not as long as you, I think," she says.Then he reaches into his chest and rips out his heart, laying it at her feet. When she looks up again, horrified, there is no wound.





	If We Grow Up, We're All Going To Be Famous

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "Mainstream" by Thea Gilmore. I wrote the majority of this back in spring of 2008, and I figured it was time to finish it. Not much happening here, just Angela Petrelli feelings for days. A lot of the Adam lines in the drinking scene belong to Gwen (no ao3 account!), from an old Heroes RP.
> 
> Also, I am well aware that there are probably gaps in the my canon knowledge. It's been since 2008, and I never got past season three. I tried!

**Takezo Kensei and the Good Wife**

_The fair-haired man moves like a shadow across the plains, running in armor that glints like scales. The sky is bright and dark by turns, a storm brewing. There are cherry blossoms crushed under her feet._

_When he's close enough for her to see his face, he says, "Hello, angel. Been waiting long?"_

_"Not as long as you, I think," she says._

_Then he reaches into his chest and rips out his heart, laying it at her feet. When she looks up again, horrified, there is no wound._

Angela Petrelli is a good wife. There isn't another option, so she's a good one. (She remembers, or thinks she remembers, days when she wasn't so good. But she forgets things.) She's a good hostess. She thinks, incorrectly, that she will probably be a good mother.

But she isn't a good person.

When Arthur and Daniel bring Adam Monroe home, Angela busies herself with being a good hostess. She serves the men coffee and horderves, and she pretends not to listen to what they're saying. Arthur is talking about his ability (which he doesn't know how to use like a fucking human being, but today she's forgotten this part). Daniel is talking about his, healing the sick and injured like the precious good Samaritan he is. Adam, though, is claiming he's unkillable.

Nobody is unkillable.

"Hold on a moment," Adam says, touching Daniel's arm, and not for the first time. They're done with the coffee. "Perhaps your wife can join us, Arthur."

"I don't think that's a good idea," Arthur says.

"Oh, but she might have something interesting to contribute," Adam says, eyes glittering.

Angela's stomach turns over. The way he looks at her isn't like the way any man has looked at her before. It's vicious. She wants it.

"Fine, I guess," Arthur says, and that's when Angela realizes that Adam is really someone special.

"And what can you do, my dear?" Adam asks Angela.

"Anything you can," Angela snaps.

"Angela," Arthur says warningly.

"No, no, it's a good answer," Adam says. "But you can't do _anything_ I can." He casually selects one of the cheese knives from the platter Angela carefully prepared. Before she can react, he drives it through the back of his hand, pinning it to the table.

Daniel cries out. Arthur says, "Adam, really!" Angela is frozen, watching, waiting.

Adam pulls the knife out, wincing. Before it's even fully out of his hand, the cut closes up. No blood, no mess. It's almost a shame.

"So what can you do, darling?" Adam asks.

Before Angela can choose her words, there's a thought in her mind that isn't her own. _I don't do anything._ She can hear herself saying it from a great distance. 

Adam frowns and nods.

Later, he asks to be walked to his car. It turns out he doesn't have one.

"Driving," he says, shaking his head. "Can't quite get the hang of it."

Angela can't get the dream out of her mind. She keeps waiting for more blood.

"Really," Adam says. He takes her hands. "Honestly. What can you do?"

"I dream," Angela says briskly, before the thought can hide itself from her. Arthur will be angry later, but she can handle that.

"Charming," Adam says.

It doesn't take them long to form the rest of the group. When Arthur sees how many women are involved, he reluctantly suggests that Angela could join. As for her, she thinks she hates most of them. Maury is a sexist pig. Carlos is weak and therefore nothing to her. Daniel is too close with Arthur and comes over without knocking. (She doesn't hate Kaito, but oh, she wishes she did.) The only one who she comes to think of as a friend is Charles. He's polite, and kind, and intelligent. If only she could make herself be attracted to him.

But no. She can only want things that will rip her heart out.

Months go by, and Adam is the center of everything. Not just for Angela, but for everyone. One afternoon, she's having tea with Charles on her porch.

"He just seems to think he knows everything," she says. Adam has again done something charming and infuriating.

"He's just a kid," Charles says carefully.

"Maybe," Angela says. "I have no idea how old he is. But if he's a kid, he's the kind Arthur would like to mentor."

Charles inclines his head in agreement. "Exactly."

Angela frowns. "_Exactly._ And to Daniel, he's a kindred spirit. He's everything each one of us values."

"You're being cynical," Charles says, but he doesn't dismiss her. "So what is he to you?"

Angela doesn't answer.

**Takezo Kensei and the Sword**

_Angela digs her nails into Adam's back, irritated that the marks will be gone in seconds. His gasp, however, is real, and she hangs on to that. She can't retrace the half-moon marks later, but she can replay the sounds he makes, when she's alone and angry. Bringing her knees together around his thighs, she rolls the two of them over, straddling him. His breathing is ragged when he whispers, “Angela, please.”_

_She doesn't aim to please, not this time. At least she made him stop calling her Angel. She rocks hard against him and he grabs her hips, not at all gently. He taps out a pattern there, feverish fingers touching her skin to spell her name in morse code. He's been doing that lately._

_His fingers will leave bruises for Arthur to run frustrated fingers over late. If Adam won't wear the marks, she'll wear them for him._

She wakes on the edge of orgasm. Arthur is asleep next to her.

The next day, the twelve of them are at the park, supposedly "bonding." Adam insists on these activities, even outside what they do the save the world.

Angela looks around the park. They're conspicuous. A group of people in their late twenties and early thirties, dressed conservatively. No hippies here. Angela could never bear that brand of freedom, and no one would ever catch her burning her bra. There are other, quieter ways to steal back power.

Carlos keeps looking behind him, a trait she noticed early on that has become more marked over the months she's known him. She dislikes him intensely, because she dislikes any visible display of weakness. She dislikes Victoria for the same reason.

Adam moves between all of them, giving Daniel a light touch on the arm, Arthur a long look, Paula a handshake when she arrives late. Angela can see the mechanism working. Adam has even earned Kaito's respect, however grudging. Angela is keeping herself away from Kaito when they're in public. God forbid she be as obvious as Adam is.

The only ones she doesn't see Adam trying to charm are Charles and herself. She wonders if she's just missing it, or if they're not people on whom charm is effective.

"Enjoying yourself, Angel?" He's started calling her that lately.

"I'm not especially interested in bonding activities," she says curtly.

Adam nods, as if he expected that. "Shall we?" He offers his arm. She doesn't take it, but she does follow him away from the group. He does this frequently--lead them away for small solo lessons on what a mess the world is getting to be.

She finds herself in a small arbor, vines twining over their heads. Adam doesn't seem to notice how lovely it is.

"Enjoying yourself now?" Adam asks, eyes twinkling. But there's some uncertainty there, she thinks. He isn't sure how to get at her.

"Don't patronize me," she says. "What do you want?"

Adma laughs, clear as a bell. "God, you're cynical, Angel. I worry about you. Well, go on. Tell me off."

"Have you figured out how impress Charles yet?" Angela asks.

Adam raises his eyebrows. "Ah," he says. He walks to a bench under the arbor and sits. Angela joins him. "You know," he says, "It's not ill-intentioned. Not at all. But I do need for them to like me. What kind of leader would I be if I didn't give them reasons to follow me?"

"I can think of better reasons to follow someone than because he batted his eyes," Angela says.

Adam nods and stretches his legs out in front of himself, looking up at the canopy of green. "Oh, that's nice," he says. "Aren't you happy? You get to use your power for good."

Angela wants to say that it's a step up from not being able to use her power at all, but why show her cards? Adam is good enough at guessing.

"I could teach you how to use a sword," Adam says casually, after a moment.

Angela can feel herself light up. No, he's found something. "Could you. What about a gun?"

"Yes," he says. "That too." He looks out across the park, the green trees heavy with rain that will surely start again soon. "I'm better with a sword, but I can teach you both. Why, afraid you'll need to kill Arthur?"

Without thinking, she slaps him across the face. In the frozen moment when she's waiting for his reaction, she realizes that he's looking at her with hunger.

The dream is stuck in her head, playing on a loop. Knowing that she's going to do it doesn't make it easier to stop.

**Takezo Kensei and the Ice Queen**

_It's snowing, drifts of white piling around her boots. She's in an open space like a park. She can feet the cold seeping into her bones, making her tired. She's in an open space, but she feels trapped, caged._

_She looks down again and realizes there's a little boy holding her hand. Her heart is ice in her chest._

_She looks again and realizes the snow is made of cherry blossoms._

Six months after she first kisses Adam, Angela is at a cafe with Kaito. Arthur has not yet made her stop going out with Kaito alone. She has not yet had to find other ways to see him. Oddly, Arthur never stopped her from going out alone with Adam. She doesn't think he even suspects.

But Adam keeps touching her wrist, her hand, the small of her back. She keeps slapping him, snapping at him, shoving him away. She feels as if her heart is on fire constantly.

She hates him. She wants him. She doesn't know if he loves or hates her, and maybe he doesn't know, either. It's intoxicating.

Outside the cafe, she can see the snow starting to pile up. They're not sitting by the window--it would be too obvious--but in a back corner, but she can still see people hurrying past as the wind picks up.

"Angela."

She turns to Kaito. "I'm sorry. I was lost in thought."

"Again," he says, nodding. "What are you worrying about?" It doesn't sound patronizing, coming from him. His deep voice rolls over her like a wave.

"Nothing," she says. Then, because he's Kaito and she trusts him, she adds, "What do you think of Adam?"

"Mm," he says. "You mean Adam as a person, or you and Adam?"

So she's that obvious, is she? It's fine. As long as Arthur doesn't know. "Either one."

"I think I can't control you," Kaito says, shrugging. She takes it to mean, _I don't want to control you._ He hesitates. "But I should tell you, Angela...I can see this going down a bad road."

That's the problem with Kaito's power. He can look at all the possible outcomes and always somehow come to the most negative conclusion.

"Of course it could," Angela says curtly. "I can see that on my own, thank you."

Instead of going to a hotel with him, as she'd planned, she excuses herself and goes home early.

That night, with Arthur away on business, Angela's dream of trying to mark Adam plays out., everything in its place. The marks, disappearing. The gasp. Her name. The bruises.

"Tell me," she hisses when she's straddling him, "What do you do for Daniel?" She saw what Daniel was almost immediately.

Adam winces. "Nothing like this, I assure you. He's a touch more submissive."

She hates Daniel for being weak. For being Arthur's. For being Adam's. She slaps Adam.

"Tell me more," she says.

Adam laughs, his voice scratchy. “I suck his cock while Arthur fucks him, usually.” It sounds almost offhand.

Angela bites her lip, to stop herself from exclaiming. No one else will use language like that to her. Arthur is too old-fashioned and Daniel is too much of a gentleman. She doesn't know about Kaito, not yet—

Her orgasm rocks her, and she cries out, feeling Adam tense under her. When she rolls off him, he groans. "In case you hadn't noticed, Angel, I'm not quite done."

She smiles. Her skin feels too tight, as though she hasn't blown off any steam at all, and she doesn't want to give him the release of tension that's eluding her. He rolls over, looking at her with a faint smile. She knows what she must look like, blouse rumpled, anger and sex in her eyes. And power. She knows that this last one is why Adam can't stop looking.

Finally, he shrugs and says, "Right, I'll just take care of it myself."

Before he can touch himself, though, Angela says, "Wait." The look in his eyes as he drops his hand resembles a plea, but there's laughter behind the expression. She knows enough about him to know she's not imagining it. "Fuck yourself with your fingers," she says, enjoying the buzzing weight and the taste of the unfamiliar words in her mouth. She considers not tossing him the lube, but she changes her mind. There are better ways to make him pay for what he's doing to her.

He keeps eye contact with her as he slicks his fingers, but when he pushes one into himself, his head snaps back.

"Good aim," Angela says dryly. "You must do this to yourself quite often."

"Nn," Adam manages, nodding a little, wrist moving faster at its odd angle.

"Say my name," she says.

Adam's eyes go wide and his fingers still. Then his silent gasp dissolves into a smirk, and he comes, whispering, "Angel."

Angela has already started to want him again, but the desire is stamped out under anger and frustration. He won again, but so did she, because she has these memories, the bruises on her hips, and the words in her mouth, resting on the back of her tongue.

Afterwards, as they're lying heated and spent in bed with each other, Adam says quietly. "Once upon a time, someone ripped my heart out."

She doesn't know what he wants her to take away from that. The things she does with Adam, the things she does with Kaito. Surely there will never be any consequences?

**Takezo Kensei and the Shadow Across the Plains**

_In this dream, Angela isn't here. She's an invisible witness on the roof of the Company building. The sunset is gold and purple, bruised colored smeared across the sky. Daniel and Adam stand on the rooftop, talking._

_"Nothing to say?" Adam asks._

_Danial just looks at him._

_Adam laughs shortly. "And why is that? You're not going to accuse me as well, or you think it goes without saying?"_

_"No," Daniel says quickly. "No, I don't think it was you. It's just so hard on Charles to lose her, and now of all times. You know they have a new baby."_

_"I know," Adam says, brooding._

_"I just know…" Danial is being so careful. "Some of us would do almost anything to keep this company together. And we all knew Charles was planning to leave."_

_"Maybe it was Carlos," Adam says lightly. "If you're unstable and the Company is all you have...Well, one never knows."_

_Daniel frowns. "I don't know. But I suppose you could have a talk with him. You're sure there's not anything you want to share?"_

_"There's not," Adam says. He puts his hand on Daniel's arm. "I'll talk to Carlos." He turns to go. "It wasn't me, Daniel. I would have killed the baby." And he goes inside._

Angela broods over the dream. It's troubling, and the most troubling part is the idea that the Company could break apart. More and more of them are getting married, though, and some are having children. Angela, too. Nathan is wonderful. He's just not her priority just now.

Adam is their unofficial leader, but in many ways, he's so ready bend to Angela. Once, Maury--who can be incredibly crude--is making comments when he thinks Angela can't hear him. She's in the next room fetching drinks when she hears him call her a bitch.

"Oh, well," Adam starts.

"That said, she's probably a bitch you can train," Maury says. "I'd like to see her on her knees."

Adam tenses, but when Adam speaks, he's laughing. "I don't know, I think I'd rather be on my knees in front of her."

So those are the reasons Angela can't quite hate Adam Monroe. At least not exclusively. That and the sex, although he's had four hundred years to learn how to use his tongue and Kaito is still better.

Tonight, they're celebrating the birth of Charles's new baby. Angela has almost forgotten the dream, although not quite. Charles is her dearest friend, and she wants only good things for him. However, it's clear he cares more about his family than about the company.

She goes and sits with him for most of the evening, as the rest of them talk and argue. She doesn't have to do those things with Charles.They can just sit near each other.

"Are you happy?" she asks him eventually.

"Mm," Charles says, sipping his champagne. "I am. But you know something's missing."

"Yes," Angela says reluctantly.

"I don't want Simone to grow up without me," Charles says.

Angela tries so hard to put the dream out of her mind.

When Charles's wife is shot, Angela tries to pretend she couldn't have guessed at it.

Things go downhill after that. They have trouble trusting each other. They trust Adam least of all, because he can't even make a show of being upset about Charles's wife.

It's been several months. They're all drinking too much, and one night Angela drinks too much too fast on an empty stomach. It's just a handful of them--Adam, Charles, Angela, Paula, Bob, and Arthur--everyone else has gone home. Adam, for once, is even drunker than Angela. He almost never does that, but tonight they're having sake, and he laughs and laughs and downs several right away.

Dizzy with it, Angela catches his wrist between her fingers and says, "You're gorgeous." She means _I hate you._

"Oh, be quiet, my little mushroom," Adam mutters. Angela doesn't track whether Arthur and the others are paying attention. Not yet, she thinks.

"It's a compliment," she tells Adam.

"Oh?" He raises an eyebrow. "You're a peach. But this flattery is making me very nervous. I may have to kill you." When Angela laughs, he says petulantly, "I could. I have a big sword."

"I know." Angela is unable to keep the sneer out of her voice. "I'm sure it has great metaphorical significance."

"It's a metaphor for me," Adam says, sobering. "Not that sword, but...It's my name."

Adam has often babbled about the hero that he is, Takezo Kensei. "You told us," Angela says. "Sword Saint."

"Terrifying, no?"

"I'm shaking," Angela says. Her hands _are_ trembling. She thinks the others are paying attention now.

Adam leans toward her. "I thought so. I killed a...a giant bear. A black bear. It was big. Bigger than you." He waves a hand at Angela, listing slightly to one side. "Twenty feet at least. Moved like a shadow across the plains…"

"Thrilling," Angela says. Something is happening in front of her and she doesn't know what it is. She has the sense of being very far away from herself, or of being suddenly just a stolen second in Adam's very long life. Her nails are digging into his forearm. The others are staring.

"Ouch!" Adam says. "You bit me." He brightens, finding his way back to his point. "I killed him and stole his scroll. I read about it in a book."

"So much adventure in your past," Bob offers.

"It didn't happen," Adam says, shaking his head too many times. "I've never seen a bear in my life. But, you know. It's a story. A good story."

"A story you lived," Angela says quietly. Maybe. None of them have ever been sure.

"Yes…" Adam frowns. "Who the hell lives four hundred years and never meets a bear? It's ridiculous."

He's lost track of his story now. He turns to the others as if remembering they exist for the first time. "Oh, hello. Well, anyway. What were we saying?"

Angela is on fire. She wants to keep picking at the scab until she sees blood. "Adam," she says.

"Oh, Angela, leave it," Arthur says, sounding frustrated. But he doesn't make her.

"What is this?" Adam asks, helping himself to another glass of sake.

"It's sake," Paula says.

"Ah. That's from Japan. I had sex there," Adam proclaims. "It was unpleasant." He drinks again. "He was tall."

"You're tall," Angela says, her breath catching. Adam rarely talks about his previous lovers.

"Taller than me. Bear tall. He moved like a shadow cross the plains….What a load of shit. Do you think shadows move across plains any differently than they cross anywhere else?"

"Maybe the plains were just the area he was crossing." Paula says annoyed. She doesn't typically have a lot of patience for Adam's antics.

"Oh," Adam says, brought up short. "There were plains. Thank you. That's been bothering me for years."

"We're here to help," Angela says. She wishes they were alone.

"You're a true friend, my queen," Adam says, and a new spike of heat goes through her.

"No," she says, "I'm not."

Adam hoisests himself up onto the table they're seated around, lying down so he can stare up at the ceiling. "Aren't we all adorable?" he says. "It's almost like real life."

"This is real life," Daniel says uncomfortably.

"Let's play a game," Adam says to Daniel. "You can be Hiro. Angela will be my Yaeko, and Arthur my Shirohige. I'll be the dragon."

Again, Angela feels far, far away and sick with it. None of the others are even making an attempt at conversation now.

"And Bob, you can be me," Adam adds as an afterthought. "But I'm not here right now."

"Is he all right?" Daniel asks.

"I don't think so," Angela says, burning.

Adam shakes his head. "This isn't right. Daniel, tell Bob you love him. That you'll be there forever. That you've never felt like this before. Like hell."

"Adam…" Daniel reaches out to touch Adam's shoulder.

"Would you cut your heart out for me, darling?" Adam says, gazing up into Daniel's eyes with an openness that makes Angela furious."Would you?"

"You know I would," Danial says, which is worse.

"You should have just killed the bitch," Adam says sharply. "No one wants your filthy heart." He sits up on the table. "We were all children. We're all children."

"Not us," Angela says, low.

Adam smiles at her. "Do you know what we're doing? Do you know what we are? You have no idea."

Her body runs hot and cold, fever and chills.

"Adam, time for bed, I think," Arthur says. "You can stay here tonight."

Adam is looking at Angela, though. "You looked like cherry blossoms and tasted like poison."

"One of those things," Angela says numbly. "I'm not your princess, Adam."

"Good," he says. "If you were, I couldn't look at you. And I certainly couldn't touch you the way I do."

It's bad, Angela knows, that Adam is saying these things in front of Arthur. But she can't seem to care.

Then Adam reaches into the waistband of his pants and takes out a gun. Everyone is frozen, waiting. Inexplicably, he points it at Bob. "If I shoot him in the head, he can't come back," he says.

"That's, that's not my power," Bob says. "Gold, remember?"

"There's a spot right at the base of his skull," Adam says. Then he laughs and puts the gun away. "God. Bedtime."

They unfreeze. Daniel moves fast, taking Adam's arm to lead him away. As he does, Adam callsback, "He's met someone, Angela! He's met someone, and she's beautiful."

The next day, she finds out that Kaito is engaged. That, combined with Arthur's fury, means another door has slammed in her face.

No one else seems to understand or remember what he said to Bob.

**Takezo Kensei and the Little Death**

_In the dream, she moves like a shadow across the plains. She can see the world running by beneath her, her stride so long she passes by tragedy and disaster in an instant. She is a storm, a bear, a dragon. There is a sword in her hand. She is coming for Adam Monroe._

And worse, and worse, and worse. She keeps sleeping with Adam, even now that Arthur knows. She's done with being afraid. She sometimes kills Adam in bed, and he laughs and laughs at her as he comes back.

Things with Arthur are worse. Things with Kaito are over. Everything is a mess. The world, that's a mess, too.

They should have seen it coming. So many of them have powers that should have made that easy, but they were blinded by Adam.

When Adam tries to release the Shanti virus, Angela remembers the dream and wonders, for a moment, if she dreamed herself to be the virus. If maybe Adam is right, if they're all small and insane.

But she also remembers where he keeps his sword, the cheap imitation of the one from the legend.

Standing face to face with him, gripping its hilt, Angela is overcome. Adam's same laughing eyes and pretty mouth are hiding something none of them suspected.

"What are you going to do to me, Angel?" he asks. "Cut my heart out?"

"Don't call me that," Angela says shortly. "Not now."

"Yes, now," Adam says. "_Yes._ Because you can't pretend I'm a stranger all of a sudden. You, with your prophetic dreams. Maury and Arthur and Charles with their telepathy. Kaito with his probability. Are you truly shocked?"

And yes, they all were. Because they believed in him. Because they loved him.

"You can't take me alone," Adam says. "Darling, you can't take me at all. Don't you remember? I can't be killed."

"There's a spot," Angela says number.The sword is so heavy. "At the base of your skull."

Adam freezes. "I was drunk. That was--"

The door opens behind her, and Kaito comes in. "I'm here," he says. "I ran." She called him because she will always call him.

"I'll do it," Angela tells Adam. "You know I will."

He looks at her sadly. "I know you will," he says.

"Kaito," she says, and Kaito nods. He doesn't say "I told you so." He doesn't say anything.

After it's all over and Adam is locked away, nothing feels right. They lived and breathed Adam Monroe for seven years. Angela can't believe it's over. Of course, it isn't.

**Takezo Kensei and the Mother**

_She is at the top of a very tall tower made of gold, a princess locked away from the world. She's wearing a kimono, and her body feels electric. She almost expects to see someone below, calling to her, but there's no one. Instead, she slowly becomes aware that there is something within the walls of the tower, blocked up in there. She can feel it breathing._

_It's a dragon._

_Her hands are made of sparks, and the sparks are bright and hot enough to melt the gold of the tower. Then she's using her hands, wrenching away the melting gold, digging for the dragon._

_When she finds him, he has laughing eyes and a pretty mouth. "Look out the window," he says._

Angela knew it would happen. She can't stay away from things forever. Always picking at the scab. She resists for years, but she does go back to where she knows he is.

As soon as she lets herself into his cell, he says, "You look older, Angela, darling. Not so pretty anymore."

"Prettier," she snaps, feeling the weight of his eyes on her. She would like to cut them out.

He laughs. “Yes.”

"Don't ask about Arthur. Don't ask about Daniel."

"Has Vegas ripped his heart out yet?"

The wording is familiar, but she doesn't want to hear it. He shouldn't even know where Daniel is. They're doing a poor job keeping him from the world.

She'd sworn she would leave without touching him, but she's bad at keeping promises. When she leaves, she asks Bob to move Adam.

A month later, she goes to see Charles. "Something terrible has happened," she tells him.

He frowns. They've seen too many terrible things. "Now you've got me worried. What is it?"

She takes a deep breath. "I'm pregnant again."

His sigh of relief isn't much comfort. It's not his body or his disaster.

"Charles," she snaps. "I don't know whose it is."

"Ah," he says. "Right. I heard Kaito was in the city recently."

And yes, that too. That too. Angela buries her face in her hands, furious. "Yes," she says, "but I'm not afraid of it being Kaito's." Arthur would be furious, but there are things even worse than that.

Charles waits.

"I went to see Adam," she says. "I can't do this. I can't risk Arthur knowing. I can't risk it looking like Adam and hating it."

That night, she dreams of a little boy with dark hair.

**Takezo Kensei and the Dragon**

_She goes to the window and looks out, and this time, there is someone there. A blonde girl in a cheerleading uniform, is standing on the stone below, looking up._

_There is a sword sticking out of her chest, but she isn't bleeding. She calls, "My love is in here. Take it."_

Angela's relationship with the next generation is...difficult. That's all right, her relationship with her own generation was difficult, too.

Over the next few decades, their lies are buried, festering under their skin. It becomes difficult to see where Daniel's act ends and where the person he used to be begins. Arthur becomes more unpredictable, more frightening. Kaito is absent, Carlos is depressed. She hasn't even heard from Harry since the day they locked Adam away. She wishes they could truly forget instead of just pretending to.

Angela knows why Arthur is filled with disdain for Peter. It's not Peter's fault, but he plays into it. To Angela, he is her dark-haired baby who could have been blonde.

For a long time, she thinks the past is dead, or as dead as something can be when it's unkillable.

Then Nathan has a daughter, a little blonde thing. A little blonde thing who can heal from any wound.

Angela's heart is electric, a rock in her chest. She knows that the mother was blonde, and that the baby should remind her of Nathan who reminds her of Arthur, but all she can see when the wounds close is Adam.

She misses having something to hate, and Claire brings the feeling back back full-force.  
Angela shivers and buries the past.

There are things other than the past she always believed were unkillable (Arthur, and his increasingly tight grip). But things are only unkillable until you take initiative.

Afterward he's in the ground, Angela invites Charles and Daniel to come see her. It's been years since she's seen Charles. He looks ill. He is ill. Maybe it shouldn't catch her by surprise. Maybe it doesn't. They've all been dying since 1977.

"I'm so sorry about Arthur," Charles tells her for about the fifth time, as they sit in Angela's living room. Charles should damn well know better. He was her friend. Time and space have intervened, though, and she thinks he never quite forgave her for not asking more questions when his wife died.

"I'll miss him," Daniel says. “But we'll go on without him.”

Charles frowns. “What exactly have you been up to, Daniel?

Angela knows. She knows so Nathan won't have to. His campaign has become all that more desperately important.

If Charles knew what Angela and Daniel are doing now, it would kill him. It may yet.

"I'm sure you're suffering more than anyone, Daniel," Angela says, interrupting their conversation. "But it must be a relief. It was so hard for you, the way Arthur was with you."

"I don't know what you mean," Daniel says. Daniel, who has developed so many defenses.

She sighs and puts her hand on Daniel’s arm. “I’m just saying you hero-worshiped him. And those feelings were never returned.”

Angela has collected little knives like this, to trot out when appropriate, and then to recycle. She likes to think it's the same as what Adam did, casting and recasting the people in his life into the same roles.

Daniel has been telling her lately that there must be a bomb. To cleanse the world. Those words did not originate in his mouth, but he doesn't seem to remember that. This isn't as large-scale as what Adam wanted. This isn't as bad as it could be. And if it works . . . Well, if it works, Nathan will be on top of the world. And maybe they'll all be safe for once.

After Charles leaves, Daniel stays for a drink, then another. The two of them sit with the absence left by Arthur, the absence left by Adam. There is no spark between them but the spark they'll light to burn the world.

"It'll be a whole new world," Daniel says, when it's ludicrously late.

She sneers. “You sound a lot like Adam these days."

"You've always sounded like him," Daniel snaps. "Everyone thought I was the one helping him, and maybe I was, but I'm amazed no one accused you. I may have been his pet, but you were his partner."

That night, she has a dream.

_"Your fire's out, Angel," he tells her. They're standing together in a park, with the sky promising rain. "But you've lost your son. Your second Daniel. Your last chance to prove that innocence really exists."_

_Breathing hurts her chest. "Innocence is weakness. Daniel realized that. It either leaves you or it kills you."_

_And suddenly, Peter is with them. Angela looks a Peter and sees a stupid kid with a dream. Is that what they looked like to Adam?_

_If Nathan is Arthur then Peter is Daniel, or at least the person Daniel used to be. Angela recognizes the naivete, the misdirected love in Peter's eyes. Adam smiles and men are willing to lay down their lives to help him destroy the world._

_Peter's fingers snag on the front of Adam's shirt, and Adam's hand rests on Peter's hip, fingers moving in a pattern Angela recognizes. Adam looks at her. A private, shared joke._

_"The years have not been kind." Adam says, looking her up and down._

_"Always the same lie, Adam," she says. "Are you so afraid of us growing old?"_

_"Oh, terribly."_

_Angela can feel the weight of Adam's fear pressing down on her, mingling with hers. All the years afraid of the terrors the world holds, the nightmares, the dread that Adam might escape. But here he is, free, and the sky isn't falling._

_Angela smiles._

_"Would you cut your heart out for me, darling?" she asks, and in that moment, she is the dragon._


End file.
